What’s happened in the business of video games this past week …
QUOTE | “Games like Call of Duty need new console hardware.” — RW Baird analyst Colin Sebastian on one of the reasons that Call of Duty: Black Ops II may not set any new sales records for Activision this Christmas.
QUOTE | “The hardcore gamer now is the niche market.” — Stew Kosoy, financier at Swiss firm Digital Capital, talking about the game industry and what they’re looking to finance.
QUOTE | “They’re unique in that they have a 100 per cent hit rate.” — Shanti Bergel, SVP of Business Development for Gree International, talking about why Gree acquired Funzio this week for $US210 million.
STAT | 436.8 per cent — Gain in buzz on social networks for Call of Duty after Call of Duty: Black Ops II was announced, according to Nielsen Media tracking.
QUOTE | “Kids are going to destroy the internet.” — Fight My Monster chairman Dylan Collins talking about the tricky under-13 market and how their expectations for games are very different.
QUOTE | “We could end up with an industry … acting blindly in short-term self-interest.” — Veteran journalist Rob Fahey, talking about the danger of publishers abusing buyers of digital products.
STAT | Five million — The number of daily users of Draw Something that Zynga has lost in the past month, dropping from 15 million to 10 million according to AppData.
QUOTE | “We embrace the law of unintended consequences.” — Jon Lander, EVE Online‘s senior producer, talking about how CCP dealt with a very tumultuous year for the MMO, including a massive fan revolt.
QUOTE | “We are concerned that the company’s accelerated release strategy is simply resulting in more churn of existing users.” — Cowen and Company analyst Doug Creutz, talking about Zynga’s loss of share in the social gaming market.
QUOTE | “Some people say paid is dead and that’s wrong.” — Phil Larsen, chief marketing officer for Halfbrick Studios, talking about their success with Fruit Ninja and other mobile games.
STAT | 500,000 — Number of downloads for the free version of Pocket Ninjas in just five days, according to developer Cocky Culture.
QUOTE | “It’s odd to see it in a third-person game and especially odd because it’s not a shooter.” — Michael Pachter, Wedbush Securities analyst, talking about God of War: Ascension and its new multiplayer mode.
STAT | 292 million — Monthly active users of Zynga games, according to Zynga’s report on their first quarter 2012, with 182 million monthly unique users.
QUOTE | “Services like this are going to become a necessity for real franchises.” — Jamie Berger, VP of Digital at Activision, talking about the growth of Call of Duty Elite and its impact on the game industry.
QUOTE | “Facebook is nothing more than a distribution platform for other businesses like Zynga.” — Dave Anderson, former Activision biz dev veteran, talking about business deals and the rise of social/mobile games.
This Week in the Business courtesy of GamesIndustry International
Image from Shutterstock
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